Lesbian pastor sues church

South Africa

Tuesday 21 May 2013 - 5:35pm

A Methodist minister, fired from her church for marrying her same-sex partner, has taken her fight to be reinstated to court. Ecclesia de Lange says her basic human rights are being trampled on.
Video: eNCA

Cape Town - A Methodist minister who was fired from her church for marrying her same-sex partner, has taken her fight to be reinstated to the courts.

Ecclesia de Lange was ordained as a Minister in the Methodist Church in 1996. She served her congregation in the Cape Twon suburbs of Brackenfell and Windsor Park.

De Lange said her church supported her when she announced that she was lesbian and would be marrying her same-sex partner.

Now, four years later, she’s fighting her former colleagues in court, after she was fired soon after the wedding.

The Methodist Church argues that while it does not have a rule forbidding same-sex marriage, no-one should attempt to enter such a union while the issue is still being grappled with, even through same-sex civil unions were legalised in South Africa in 2006.

De Lange says she feels strongly that as a Christian, getting married is her basic human right.